Nightmare Harlem
by Peppahmint
Summary: AU. Chapter 3 up! Everything in Hitomi's life has gone wrong. Things only get worse when she faints, and wakes up in the Harlem. Lotsa pairings! Merle makes her debut!
1. Prologue

Disclaimer's Note: I own nothing, 'cept for the plot line.

Song: _Tourniquet_ by Evanescence

* * * * *

Nightmare Harlem

Prologue

_I tried to kill the pain,  
But only brought more  
I lay dying  
And I'm pouring crimson regret and betrayal  
I'm dying, praying, bleeding and screaming  
Am I too lost to be saved?  
Am I too lost?  
_  
This is depressing. 

_My God, my Tourniquet  
Return to me Salvation  
My God, my Tourniquet  
Return to me Salvation_

Damn you, Amano. How could you leave me? 

And Yukari, how could you? Your best friend in the whole world…and you go behind her back and steal her boyfriend from her.

Everything in my life has just gone so wrong…  
  
_Do you remember me,   
Lost for so long?  
Will you be on the other side  
Or will you forget me?  
I'm dying, praying, bleeding and screaming  
Am I too lost to be saved?  
Am I too lost?_

I'm dying.

Did you know that? 

I'm dying. 

Why? . . . you ask.

 In one word – I'm sick.

Really sick.

I'm not sure how much longer I can hold out.

I have nothing to live for any more. . .  
  
_My God, my Tourniquet  
Return to me Salvation  
My God, my Tourniquet  
Return to me Salvation  
  
(I want to die!)_  
  
_My God, my Tourniquet  
Return to me Salvation  
My God, my Tourniquet  
Return to me Salvation_

Everything is black.

No surprise there – I was lying on my bed with my eyes closed, after all.

But even then, there was still some light.

Now, there is none.   
  
_My wounds cry for the grave  
My soul cries for Deliverance  
Will I be denied?  
Christ  
Tourniquet  
My Suicide_

Am I dead?

I must be.

But I'm feeling pain…

Ow.

My butt is killing me.

I've landed somewhere, I know that.

But where?

* * * * *

Short, quick lil' story for you. Please R&R! Hope you enjoyed it. This is my first V of E (Vision of Escaflowne) fic ever. Don't worry, it will get better eventually. I have the whole plot already worked out in my head. I just gotta figure out how to put it on e-paper so y'all can read it on FF.Net.


	2. The Harlequin

Here it is, the long-awaited (?) second chappie!!!

Van makes his debut in this chapter!!!! Read on if you wanna find him!!!

'_blah blah blah blah'  thinking_

"_blah blah blah blah" Van talking (you'll understand why it's in italics in a minute)_

* * * * * Nightmare Harlem—Chapter 2—The Harlequin * * * * *

_'Owwwie....'_ Hitomi thought. '_Where in hell am I?'_

She stood up and looked around. It didn't take her long to figure out that wherever she was, there was no doubt that it was a very strange place. Large black abstract squiggles (A/N: For want of a better word) floated past her against a background of white nothingness. She wasn't sure whether or not she was floating as well. At first, it had felt like she'd been on solid ground, but she'd just discovered that she could walk upstairs and downstairs when there weren't any stairs to walk down, and that areas where she'd previously walked down or up stairs could also just as suddenly become flat (although invisible) ground. (A/N: Sorry if this doesn't make any sense). 

After she had discovered all this, she sank to her knees with exhaustion. All the events of the past week had just worn her out. First off, the doctor's latest diagnosis on her condition…then catching Amano, her ex-boyfriend, and Yukari, her ex-best friend, engaged in a passionate make-out session…and now, this. It was all too much.

She started sobbing. She didn't know why, but she suddenly felt very alone. How could all this be happening to her? She was only 15, for crying out loud! The teenage years were supposed to be happy…not a time in which you wanted to commit suicide but couldn't be bothered considering what was the purpose of ending your life sooner then it would already? All you'd be doing is spilling blood everywhere. If you're suicidal and sick with a deadly disease, just wait for the disease to kill you. Hopefully, you'll die as happy as a dying teen can die in your sleep. 

"_Hey, sleeping beauty…"  The echoey voice filled Hitomi's head and was enough to bring her to some state of semi-consciousness._

"Uhhh…" Hitomi moaned.

"_Rise and shine, bishoujo-chan…"  There went that echoey voice again. It was definitely a guys voice, that was for sure…not deep enough to be a mans, yet too deep for a boys…_

'_Bishoujo-chan…huh?'  Hitomi thought._

"Who are you?" Hitomi demanded, somewhat groggily.

"_Look around..." the voice offered. _

Hitomi obliged, but after scouting around herself for so long she was positive her head was going to fall off, she stopped.

"_Look down…you probably won't see me at first, few do…I'll give you a clue though, I'm right by your feet."_

Again, Hitomi looked around. And again, she didn't notice anything out of the ordinary…save for the freaky place she was currently in…until she spotted her shadow. 

Her shadow was looking extremely odd…it was too tall to be her shadow, for starters. It was also in a completely different position then she was. She had her hands suspended in mid-air, since she'd just spun around, but her shadow had its arms folded across its chest. To top it off, Hitomi was still in her school uniform, which consisted of, among other things, a short skirt. Her shadow was not wearing a short skirt. It wasn't wearing a skirt at all. 

"_Good." The voice commented. __"You found me."_

"You're in my shadow?!!!" Hitomi exclaimed, her eyes not budging from her shadow on the floor (or lack thereof [A/N: The floor, I mean]). 

Hitomi stared in awe as her shadow shrugged its shoulders. Funny thing was, she herself hadn't done any shrugging whatsoever. "Who are you?!" Hitomi demanded nervously. She screamed when she saw The Thing—whatever it was—come out of her shadow and land on the floor(?).

_"I'm the Harlequin."_ it said. For the first time, Hitomi got a look at the thing's face. 

The Harlequin looked sort of like a boy around Hitomi's age. Tall, with well-developed, although not monstrously huge, muscles, and a sharp, angular, rather handsome face. The "sort of" part came from his colouring. His skin was as white as a ghost's. The pupils in his eyes were, too. He had messy black hair, the darkest black Hitomi had ever seen. His eyes were the same dark black as his hair. Not the whites of his eyes—those were white, like they were on normal humans—the part of the eye that's normally coloured was that pitch-black shade. He wore a very odd outfit consisting of black and white abstract patterns and shapes. 

"What are you, then?" Now that she'd seen him, she wasn't as afraid of him as she had been originally, back when he'd been an echoey voice. However, the period in which she had this sense of security fled fleetingly with his next words.

_"A spirit…"_

"A what?!?!"

_"You know, like a ghost." _The spirit was sounding very bored now.

"So you're like, dead?!!!"

A ringing noise was suddenly heard. The kind you here on game shows when the contestant actually gets the correct answer.

"I take it I'm right?" Hitomi had always had paranoia about ghosts. Naturally staring at one in the flesh—okay, maybe he was lacking in that department—was doing very little to help matters.

The Harlequin just rolled his eyes, which only freaked Hitomi more. Why, she did not know. 

_"'My 'name now, as I already told you, is the Harlequin. A harlequin was originally an Italian clown of some sort who wore bright colours, often arranged in diamond-like shapes. He would do his tricks without speaking. As I know you are already  aware of, yes, I can speak, no, I am not a clown, and I only wear black and white. Yes, you were right to guess that I am the soul of a deceased person. In life, I was known as Van Slanzar de Fanel. My older brother murdered me. Needless to say, he didn't live too long after that stunt, courtesy of_moi. _I'm not going to hurt you, so there's no need to cower away into a non-existent corner. I'll admit, if all I knew about ghosts came from highly unrealistic horror movies, I'd be scared of myself too.'_

_'Welcome to the Nightmare __Harlem__. I'll be here to help you if you need it. I'm currently stuck being a greeting service for all the outsiders like yourself. Any questions?'"_

"Whaddya mean, you're stuck being a greeting service?"

_"My father realized that royalty was dying out in the late 1800's, so he found this odd stone and made some sort of wish upon it and sent me, my mother, and my brother, along with himself, here. I was the only person in the family who didn't enjoy our _"relocation"_. I like technology a lot, and here is just so…backwards. Like the Middle Ages, almost. Anyways, since I died and became a ghost, and the _Harlem___ likes putting their ghosts to work, this is my job. I don't enjoy it, and I'm not getting paid to do this. The only thing I'm getting out of this is my own palace with servants and the whole shebang that I can just wander around it when I please—and when nobody new has come."_

"Oh." She didn't know what else to say. 

_"So, since we've got nothing better to do, why don't you come with me back to my palace? I'll warn you though—it has all sorts of weird booby traps, none of which I set up or am even responsible for, so don't ask me, and you have to beware of the Sugarplum Fairy. She's not the same girl from the Nutcracker Ballet. This Sugarplum Fairy was an overpossessive catgirl in my life, and now that I'm dead, she's still going strong."_

"Who was she? Like, you're sister or something?"

_"She was my adopted sister, I guess you can say. She apparently thinks she's my girlfriend, however—every time I bring a chick over, she does everything short of maiming them. It's only really the girls she does this to, however." _ He neglected to mention that it was only the girls—the pretty girls, that is—that he was stuck showing around that he brought over to his palace. [A/N: Hitomi doesn't know this yet, though.]

Hitomi raised an eyebrow. No way in HELL was she going over there, with someone like the Sugarplum Fairy lurking about.

_"If it helps, I'll tell her to keep her paws off you at all times, upon pain of being catnip-less, milk-less, and fish-less for a whole decade."_

His words were of small assurance. "Is this a practice you regularly engage in, inviting girls over to your house?"

_"Yup." _Hitomi noticed a faint gray hue appearing on his cheeks. If it wasn't for the fact that it was grey, Hitomi would've thought he was blushing. Then she remembered that the Harlequin was all black and white, even when it came to his face and eyes and hair. He probably _was_ blushing.

"Looks like you can also show a few shades of grey, Harlequin."

The grayness on his cheeks only got more gray. If he wasn't so black-and-white colour-wise, his cheeks would have been bright red. Hitomi giggled at this.

"You're blushing."

_"Shut up."_

"You're not denying it, either."

No response.

"If that's the case then let's go!!!"

And so they were off to the Harlequin's palace.

* * * * *

Longer chappie for y'all this time! Please, R&R, peeps!

Lol…now I'm sounding like Tyson's grandpa (Beyblade). This in itself is scary.

In response to your questions about Hitomi…she's dying because of a disease like cancer. However, I haven't decided on what disease she's dying from yet—I want it to be a disease like cancer, but I don't want her to lose her hair. Could you reviewers maybe suggest some possible deadly diseases that are curable for me? Don't forget to list the cures and any side effects of both the disease and the cure. 

Here's the Latest Update on Hitomi's Condition. She's not really dying. She's seriously ill, about to be moved into the hospital, and she could die from whatever disease she's got, but she could also get well. Right now, her condition is serious enough so that either way is very real for her. But she's so depressed because her boyfriend, Amano, left her for her best friend, Yukari, that she (Hitomi) is in a very pessimistic mood right now. 

Hope that answers all your questions.


	3. Sugarplum Fairy and Ballroom Dancing P1

Thankeez to all the reviewers!!! Here ya go!!! Chocolate chip cookies for everyone!!! Don't worry—my mom made them, not me. Personally, I don't think I _can cook. ^_^; _

And yup, you guessed it—Merle is the Sugarplum Fairy!!!!

P.S. I bumped up the rating from PG to PG13. I knew I'd have to do it eventually. Anywayzerz, rated for alcohol, the odd bad lil' word, and possibly blood in future chaps. 

On a final note: I realized that after I'd written this chapter, I had neglected to include a description of Merle in her Sugarplum Fairy regalia. Since my brain has taken a vacation without my permission, I'll save her descrippie for the next chapter. Speaking of the next chapter, originally, I was gonna have 1 long super-chap, but by the time I'd finished the first ½, it was already longer then my average chapter length (that being 4 pages in Verdana font, whereas this is 6 pages in Verdana).

And for the disclaimer's: From now on, see first chap. Thank you and leave me alone, lawyers!!! 

Now, to the story!!!!

* * * Nightmare Harlem—Chapter 3—The Sugarplum Fairy and Ballroom Dancing—Part 1* * * 

Hitomi's heart was pounding. Why? Hell, if she knew that, it wouldn't be pounding, now, would it? OK, it still might be pounding even if she knew, but then it would be if she nearly lost her life or saw a ghost or something.

Oh. That's right. She had seen a ghost. The Harlequin. Personally, she preferred calling him Van, although the few times she had so far, he had seemed a bit unused to being called it. 

But oh gods!!! She'd just flown all the way from the freaky place she landed in all the way to this gorgeous palace in _his arms!!! She kept telling herself that it was the flying that was giving her goosebumps, **not** him, but her heart just didn't seem to listen. _

So she was here now, in his palace, with no sign of the Sugarplum Fairy. According to Van—er, the Harlequin—she'd gone out shopping for a party that was to be held that night.

_"Hitomi…"_

"Heya, Harle."

Harlequin raised an eyebrow. _"Excuse me?"_

"Harle. You have a problem with being called that?"

He sighed, sounding somewhat exhausted. _"Nope."_

"Good!"

The Harlequin paused for a moment. _"Umm…Hitomi?"_

"Yea?"

_"Umm…would you like to go to that party?"_

"I'd have nothing to wear."

_"We could find something."_

"Really? Ok, then. Why?"

_"Because if I don't get a member of the female race to go with me, I will be subject to mass glomping by rabid women who think I'm cute but who also think that every single guy in this damned dimension is  cute and who in reality need to get a life, because throwing yourself at the feet of every single male you meet is not what I call _having _a life."___

Hitomi giggled. "You must be funny to watch at these parties. All the women…begging for "a minute" with you…you throwing a tantrum because this happens at every single party—"

_"—Correction." _Van interrupted. _"It happens everywhere__."_

"Ok, everywhere—" Hitomi paused. "What did you mean when you said "damned dimension"?  Is that where we are? In another dimension of some sort?"

_"Yup. Welcome to the Nightmare __Harlem__. Another dimension to the one you're used to, whatever that may be called."_

"Why's it called the Nightmare Harlem?"

_"Dunno. So, getting back on topic, will you go with me to the party?"_

"You never mentioned I'd be going with you."

He rolled his eyes. _"And who else would you be going with?"_

"Trying to snag a date?"

He began blushing grey again, but when he next made eye contact with her, there was a light of challenge in his eye. _"What happens if I say 'yes'?"_

Now it was Hitomi's turn to blush. Van silently cheered in triumph. Then an idea crossed his mind. Turning to Hitomi, he spoke. _"Stay here for a minute, kay? I'll just run upstairs and grab a few dresses for you to where to the party."_

"Did I say I was going?"

Then Hitomi heard Van's voice come out of thin air, followed by her own. Somehow, Van had recorded a past snippet of their conversation and was now playing it. [A/N: Conversation is in bold. Italics is used only for Hitomi thinking and Van speaking.]

'**"Umm…Hitomi?"**

**"Yea?"**

**"Umm…would you like to go to that party?"**

**"I'd have nothing to wear."**

**"We could find something."**

**"Really? Ok, then—"**'****

Van smirked, while Hitomi slapped herself on the head.

_"Do you not wanna go?"_

"Oh no—I still plan on going."

_"Then I'll be going now to get you a dress."_ And with that, he was gone.

One thing Hitomi did NOT like about Van—his personality changed so quickly. If Van had any mental disorder at all—or rather, if he had any mental disorder when he was alive—Hitomi was positive it would've been Bipolar Disorder. That was a mental problem which was marked by alternating episodes of happiness and depression. People with Bipolar disorder often had terribly sudden mood changes, thus making them very unpredictable. Van didn't seem too bad with his mood changes though, so Hitomi brushed it off as it being "just him" and sat down to wait and see whatever dress Van chose to bring down for her.

Meanwhile…

Van, the little demon eternal (A/N: Don't ask) had 2 dress picked out for her. The first one was an elegant sleeveless pink silk dress, and the second one was a bright red number with a plunging neckline that would majorly show off her cleavage. His reasons for picking the red one? None, really. Only that he wanted to see her cheeks flush when she saw the dress. He knew from the little conversation he'd had with her that she wouldn't be caught dead in such a dress. He just wanted to embarrass her. 

And then, horror upon horrors, there was the sound of the front door being thrown open, hitting the wall, and bouncing off due to the sheer strength with which it had been thrown open. This was followed by the voice that haunted his dreams—okay, make that his nightmares.

"I'M H-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-M-M-M-E-E!!!" Merle yelled.

(A/N: No, I swear, I don't hate Merle!!! She's not my fave, but she's OK!!! I swear by it!!! NO-O-O-O!!! *screams as Merle fans proceed to kill her—the authoress, not Merle*)

* * * * *

The trio were now seated in the parlour. Needless to say, Van was Not Happy. Merle had done nothing but shriek her head off at Hitomi, then, once her voice went hoarse, curled up next to Van on the couch, draped her arms around him, and glared at Hitomi. Van figured now that Merle couldn't screech any more, it was as good a time as any to introduce them.

_"Okay…"_ The girls looked at him, expecting him to continue.

_"Time for introductions."_ Merle groaned loudly at this, but was silenced by a glare from Van.

_"Hitomi Kanzaki, meet the Sugarplum Fairy, aka Merle. Merle; Sugarplum Fairy, meet Hitomi Kanzaki, our latest guest from the 3rd dimension."_

"Greetings." Hitomi gave a phony, albeit warm, smile to Merle.

Merle just scowled.

"By the way…" Hitomi turned her attention to Van "what do you mean when you say 'the 3rd dimension'?" she questioned.

_"The first dimension is a straight line. The second dimension is a square. The 3rd dimension is a cube, meaning that it's realistic. You, being an inhabitant of the Earth, are from the 3rd dimension. The fourth dimension is space. Somewhere in there—don't ask me where, I'm not a scientist—is where we are. We're three-dimensional, but we're not of the third dimension."_

"Well, what's that supposed to mean?"

_"Do I look like a scientist to you?"_

"No, you look like a dead guy." Hitomi stated, observing that Van was looking a tad see-through.

Van paused for a moment. Good line on her part. He shrugged. Why not just admit it? That way, he'd have the last word. _"Good point." he admitted. _"Now, about your dress…"__

"What dress?" Merle perked up. 

_"She's coming to the party with us."_

"She is?!!! You didn't tell me that!!!"

_"That's because she didn't come until today."_

"No fair!!! How come she gets to go?"

_"Merle, how is it 'not fair'? It's perfectly fair. You're going, too."_

"It—it just isn't!!!" Merle stormed out of the room in a huff, leaving Van and Hitomi alone in the room together. Turning to Hitomi, Van figured he should pick up where he left off.

_"Getting back to your dress…"_

"What about it?" Hitomi replied. "You got it picked out?"

_"Yup. Two of them, actually."_ Reaching behind the couch he was on, he pulled them both out. _"Now, this first one I want your initial reaction on." He pulled out the bright red one with the very low neckline. Hitomi's jaw dropped. Smirking, he put it down. __"And this is the one I think you'll actually be wearing." He showed her the pink one._

Hitomi shrieked and pounced, and the next thing Van knew, he was being glomped by an over-enthusiastic Hitomi. "Oh my god!—thank you so much, Van!!! It's gorgeous!!!" she squealed.

_"Aww…no biggie."_ Van replied. 

* * * * *

And part one of "The Sugarplum Fairy and Ballroom Dancing" is complete!!! The next chapter will actually have some ballroom dancing, so don't worry. I'm also planning for a lil' alcohol in it—whaddya think?

Review, plz!!! I'll give ya cookies…*holds out plate of chocolate-chip cookies*…and if that's not enough to get you to review…*holds out plate of donuts* take one of these.

Normally, I don't have to bribe my reviewers like this, but like I said at the beginning, my brain has taken a vacation without my permission, so until it comes back, I will be acting very strange.


End file.
